August 16, 2017
Written by Arthur Crudup
Produced by Sam Phillips
Recorded at Sun Studios, Memphis, TN, July 1954
Released as a single on July 19, 1954
The first hit song for Elvis Presley launched with a meteoric rise over a couple of nights in Memphis in July 1954. During a heretofore unfruitful recording session a Sun Studios with producer Sam Phillips, Presley began improvising with an stepped-up version of the song “That’s All Right, Mama”, written and recorded by Arthur Crudup in 1946. At the encouragement of Phillips, session guitarist Scotty Moore and bassist Bill Black worked out an arrangement with Presley and the song was recorded live in the studio that very night.
Two days after its recording, Phillips gave copies of the record to local Memphis disc jockeys as the nervous, 19-year-old Presley went to the movies in fear of critique. When he emeged, he found that Dewey Phillips of WHBQ had played the song over a dozen times due to overwhelming listener response and Presley was invited to go to the station and do an on-air interview that very night. Officially released a few weeks later, “That’s Alright” sold around 20,000 copies in the Memphis area, not enough to chart nationally, but a definite catalyst to Presley’s career, starting with Moore and Black officially signing on as Presley’s backup group.
Listen to “That’s Alright”:
Song Lyrics
That’s all right for you
That’s all right, little mama, just any way you do
That’s all right, that’s all right
That’s all right, little mama any way you do.
Well, Mama she done told me
Papa done told me too
“Son, that gal you’re foolin’ with she ain’t no good for you”
But that’s all right, that’s all right
That’s all right, little mama any way you do.
Well, I’m leavin’ town now, baby
I’m leavin’ town for sure
Well, then you won’t be bothered with me
Hangin’ ’round your door
That’s all right, that’s all right
That’s all right, little mama any way you do.
